Merche has very little left to live and wants to take advantage of the time by fulfilling her dream and those of her friends. They seem like easy things, but there is nothing simple for this group of four retired women who do nothing but get into trouble. This is how My Other Jon begins, a comedy starring Carmen Maura and directed by Paco Arango, a diversion that is also a song to life, the proceeds of which will be allocated entirely to the fight against childhood cancer.
Arango is the promoter of the Aladina Foundation, an entity that finances the construction of children’s oncology plants in hospitals and helps the families of sick minors. “I had done volunteer work that stole my life and I knew that I had to continue, that is why I created this Foundation 18 years ago, which carries out very important works in twenty public hospitals, such as Vall d’Hebron here in Barcelona, where it deals with the oncology area with an investment of seven million euros,” explains Arango.
When Arango asked Maura to be the protagonist of his new film, she did not hesitate because “I loved the script,” but then the relationship between them grew, as the actress met the Aladina Foundation and was “impressed.” “Everything I saw in the hospitals touched my soul and I wished that Paco’s way of being would rub off on me a little bit,” says Maura, who has traveled with Arango to Barcelona for the preview of My Other Jon, which will take place tonight. at the Aribau cinema. Tomorrow it will hit the billboard.
Just because My Other Jon is a charity film does not mean that the actors and the rest of the crew worked for free. “We have been paid and, the truth is, a little more than what they normally pay us,” explains Maura and Arango adds that “if someone thought that my films were not paid, I wouldn’t be able to make films, the union would run away from me.” In the large cast of My Other Jon “there are only two exceptions, Ana Obregón, who donated her salary, and Mariano Rajoy, who acted completely free of charge.”
Yes because Rajoy makes his debut as an actor in this film. Arango wrote a joke for “María José Alfonso in which she said that she had dreamed that she lived in a big Hollywood-style mansion, but that there was a catch, because instead of being married to a hottie, her husband was Mariano Rajoy.” “. And then the director wondered if the former president would want to appear in the film: “I contacted him through a friend and he immediately said yes.”
“In the first take he did it terribly, but the next one it came out fantastic. It was a love and I thought he enjoyed it a lot. When it comes on the screen, no one expects it and the laughter is resounding,” adds Arango, whose film also features in the cast with Olivia Molina, Fernando Albizu, Carlos Santos, Marisol Ayuso, María Luisa Merlo, Juanjo Artero and Aitana Sánchez-Gijón among others.